


everything you don't want, that's what i've got

by childofthenightcity



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Angst, Blood and Injury, Depression, F/M, Gen, Graphic Description, Hurt/Comfort, Near Death Experiences, Terminal Illnesses, Whump, big big big angst, can be read as arima x hirako, i love arima but does arima love himself?, take hirako is a really good person, the answer is no
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-30
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:55:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25000489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/childofthenightcity/pseuds/childofthenightcity
Summary: Arima knows he doesn't have long left. Time slips cruelly away in each lost evening and painful morning. When he begins to play more loosely with his life and his teammates see him injured, only Take can see the bigger picture. As tragedy drives them closer, Arima realises it's time to trust him with the secret of the One-eyed King.This began as a one-shot exploring the massively complicated relationship between Arima and Take, and ended up as something I want to take further because Arima and Hirako fascinate me <3
Relationships: Arima Kishou & Hirako Take, Arima Kishou & Ihei Hairu, Arima Kishou & Kaneki Ken | Sasaki Haise, Arima Kishou & Mado Akira, Arima Kishou/Hirako Take
Comments: 11
Kudos: 23





	1. Chapter 1

_He, Ainu, the aged eagle,  
He who is old and wrinkled, and tired of pain,  
Of snow-white beard, of majestic attus,  
He sharpens his makiri, cross-legged.  
He trims the deadman’s fingers, and his mind clouds.  
O toiyan kuttari! (Thou who art laid out on the ground!)  
All is good, and I pray!  
I grow old, and I lament!  
I am white, already gleaming!  
I fade ever so soon…_

_\- Kitahara Hakushuu_

He barely felt the pain, because by his very nature it had been ruthlessly beaten and bred out of him, but a familiar sense of despair hit Arima Kishou in waves as the kagune of an underground SS Rank slammed violently into his right cheek and shoulder, its scaled surface ripping through thin fabric to skin and muscle. He registered dimly, thankfully, that his glasses were not hit. But the blow shook him to his very core; it cut right through to a deep mortal fear that he had been trying to pretend wasn’t there for a long time. He finally felt the raw sting as blood began to flow from the deep gash that had opened along the collarbone, from the front of his neck to his right shoulder.

Without hesitating, he swung round and closed both his eyes, listening to, pinpointing, the triumphant chuckle of the ghoul in the darkness. He heard the scuffle of it rushing towards him, and - eyes still closed - swung IXA with an agitated flick upwards, feeling the vibrations as it vertically halved the ghoul in midair, the chuckle lost in a horrific choked gurgle. Its body fell to the floor of the damp tunnel with a wet thud.

He lowered IXA. And realised, with a small jolt, that his hands were trembling. From behind him in the dark twisting passageway, nearly a kilometer underground in the 24th Ward, he heard the shouts and shrill noises of the rest of Squad 0 engaged with equally ferocious ghouls, the ones he had left behind specifically for them to practice dealing with. Arima had gone on ahead, leaving his usual trail of slaughter. They had all been as vicious and defensive as they usually were in the 24th ward - and up until a minute ago he had been as deadly as he usually was. Now he felt alien pain.

His breathing got shallower, and he put a hand up to his neck in disbelief at the amount of blood flowing through his fingers. Apart from his frequent sprains and more recently the bruises (usually on his ribs) borne of pure physical exertion, this was the first time Arima had allowed a fight with a ghoul to injure him in nearly five years. It was true, there had been some near misses as of late, but he had pushed them out of his mind. The blood was spurting, rapidly staining the right side of his jacket, his hand entirely slicked red as he pressed it tighter to his neck. Arima began to feel lightheaded as pain gripped him, and IXA dropped to the ground with a metallic echo as he realised with a resigned misery that his Squad would catch up to him in a minute, and they would see what had happened.

 _You fool,_ he thought to himself. _You utter fool. This is what you get for denying what you are._

It had begun a few months ago, when he became irritated by the lights flickering during a meeting. When he’d checked them after the meeting, he discovered the lights were fine. Plaguing his days, and continuing into the nights, a distracting blur began to grow in the corner of his vision, and soon half of everything he saw was confusingly too bright or too dark. He quickly deduced that his right eye had something foreign blossoming deep inside it, and he also knew why. It grew stronger and darker, but he had tried his utmost not to give anyone, even Squad 0, an inkling as to what was happening to him. That his own body was beginning to betray him.

He quickly became mindful of his defense on the right, and began to favour advancing left on his attacks, although they were seamless and as effective as usual. People talking loudly and suddenly on his right hand side made him flinch. He hit a doorframe in his apartment at nighttime, and was nearly brought to tears as he lay in bed, with shame and hatred for both himself, and this sure sign that the horizon of time could have crept so close. And still he did not breathe a word, even as the world through his right eye became an empty land of shadows and spectres, and dim refractions of light.

Even as he denied it was happening to him, he looked in his bathroom mirror at a clear grey pupil that had become misty and useless. Thankfully, his glasses and white hair meant that most idiots at the CCG barely noticed it, for even the senior investigators were usually too cowed to stare him directly in the face. But the message it was sending him could not be ignored. It served as a constant reminder that even for the White Reaper of the CCG, Death stalked closer. It never left him. It grew silently, pushed him into the depths of denial about the amount of time he had left, and within the space of a few months it had stolen half his sight from him. And it was especially bad in the dim light of the underground tunnels, where doves played whack-a-mole with monsters.

It was glaucoma, forty years too early. But he no longer had the luxury of time.

The blood flow wouldn’t slow, and his hand became slippery as he winced and picked up IXA, deactivating it into the case. He felt the grey ghost in his eye grinning grimly in the darkness. But it appeared that there really were no more ghouls down this particular tunnel, or they would have come at him already. He heard the splashes of two people and footsteps come up behind him in the tunnel. Take… and Akira. He knew them by smell and footfall alone.

“Are there any more of them up here? Our intel shows that-“

“None.” he replied quietly, hearing the echo. He didn’t want to turn round, _didn’t want them to see... didn’twanttoturn...didn’tdidn’tdidn’t-_

“Oh my goodness! Arima-san, what happened!? Is that ghoul blood? What in hell happened!? Are you alri-“ he held up a quiet hand to stop her, feeling an alien embarassment and shame creeping up on him. He had registered Hirako’s quiet exclamation of shock, also. That was more hardhitting, seeing Hirako express emotion.

“Is the ghoul who did this… dead?” asked Hirako, and there was a strange edge to his voice.

“Dead,” replied Arima, gesturing tiredly at the body on the ground, and taking a step foward. They both moved to him as if to support him. Akira approached him with a torch and her usual firmness, moving his hand and staring disbelievingly at the deep and bloody cut stretching from his right cheek to his bicep, through his white jacket and undershirt, and the armor he _didn’t wear, you stupid, stupid dying bastard, Kishou._ The torchlight illuminated the dark spreading stain of the blood, a heavy contrast against his pale skin and bone-white hair and white, white coat. He squinted at her expression and recognised it - despite herself, the sight of the barely-mortal Arima, CCG’s Reaper, injured just like the rest of them - led to a look of disillusionment. Hirako was still standing there cautiously behind her, quietly disturbed as he saw the scale of Arima’s injury.

He resigned himself to the knowledge that they now had to return, and asked her to carry IXA, which she did almost timidly. That in itself was seriously unusual. Putting his bloodied hand tightly back over the pulsing cut, he made sure to walk briskly and powerfully, ignoring the pain and their worried stares at each other behind his back, knowing that they both must be wondering what on earth went wrong - because surely there had not been a ghoul more powerful than Arima Kishou. _It’s just that I’m dying,_ he thought to them, _nothing much._

Blood rolled in a steady stream down his sleeve, dripping from his fingertips. He felt vaguely lightheaded, and already knew that this went beyond his half-ghoul healing capabilities.

They reunited with the rest of Squad 0, which today numbered only 3. He thanked the ceiling silently, over and over again, that Ui wasn’t here. He would have gotten another injury from the man; that or Ui would have killed him. A small voice in his head whispered that maybe death was the answer, but he blocked it out brutally. The younger Squad 0 members followed him through the dark, foul tunnel in complete silence, unusual for them. Usually the journey home was full of discussion - it would be Akira (or Ui on the rare chance he joined them) teaching them techniques and letting them know where they had made mistakes, or Hirako, Hairu and on some occasions Arima himself demonstrating formations, attacks and defences to them. They learned as they went, the way Arima wanted it to be. But now they had seen his blood, felt Akira and Hirako’s tension, he felt shame. And a growing unease - not only at the fact that the pain was not going away, but at the knowledge that he had besmirched himself in the eyes of the Garden Children, something he in all his power had always hoped to avoid. They must see his right shoulder covered in blood, see Akira holding IXA, and lose faith.

Just as he was about to open his mouth to say something he would probably regret, Hirako’s headset buzzed. It was on speaker. Marude’s crackling voice echoed through the tunnel, checking for an update and asking them to return for extraction.

Hirako was about to report injuries when Arima put up a swift hand signal that meant: No. Arima could always read Hirako very well, sometimes too well, even when others could not detect any of his emotions at all, and he saw now that it was frustration. But no matter what happened, Hirako would always, always obey him. The headset connection closed. And suddenly they were all staring at him. The eyes of the garden children hovered terrified in the dim light, Akira’s eyes fierce with retribution when there was none to be had. And Hirako’s eyes wouldn’t leave his shoulder. Arima could almost hear the thoughts rushing behind the man’s eyes.

And his shoulder hurt, and his hands shook lightly, but he knew that no matter what he did he had to keep up appearances. As they headed back to base it suddenly dawned on him how much of an impact this relatively lesser injury would really cause to the rest of the CCG. This would be talked about. He had to make it look as though it was menial, or the ghoul’s blood, until they could treat it. Although increasing amounts of blood running down the arm of a pure white suit and bloodied hands was not ‘nothing’.

Before they reached the entrance to the vast chamber in which the operation was based, Arima stopped. The lights were suddenly bright, fluorescent and harsh, illuminating them all. He could see how bad it looked now. His entire right shoulder and sleeve of his coat was spreading with blood throughout. He took IXA’s case back from Akira.

“You’re even paler than usual, Arima-san, _please_ get medical help.” she spoke disbelievingly, as though wondering if that was something he even knew about.

“Of course. I hope you all understand that I... must keep up appearances. This looks bad for CCG and Squad 0. Tell anyone who pesters you that it’s ghoul blood from an unfortunate angle. It’s partly true.”

Oh, the double edge to this statement. Yes, some of the blood was from the ghoul he killed. But the rest of it was his own filthy half-ghoul blood. Blood that meant he could only register their hurried nods with one eye.

“We... we’ll tell them that you’re not even injured!” It was Isei who spoke up, small voice full of worry. Arima allowed him a rare smile of gratitude as another wave of lightheadedness struck. He was still losing blood, too much blood. The Garden children seemed slightly reassured by his act, but he knew that Akira and Hirako were not in the slightest. They were experienced. They knew how bad the injury was.

“Now. Everyone report to where you have to be. I want all of us out of here as soon as possible. In my opinion this mission has been more trouble than it’s worth. I’ll see you all at HQ. And Hirako... please stay with me.” His voice trailed off. He couldn’t help it. His entire left side was throbbing with alien pain, and it was all he could do not to drop IXA again. Arima acknowledged their scared glances and watched them hurry towards respective trucks and investigators. Akira gave him a long look before leaving also, catching sight of him pulling on black leather gloves to hide the blood and the shaking.

Hirako still did not utter a word.

“ _Damn_ my hair.” Arima said softly. It made him instantly stand out amongst every CCG investigator down here. He just had to get to the private medical trailer, which was thankfully tucked behind Marude’s, where he was supposed to report to anyway. Hopefully it would just be Hairu there, who he had asked to stay back today. God forbid it was Ui.

He began the painful (for appearing to move powerfully in his state was now painful) journey to Marude’s operations trailer and comms base. He took a step and motioned reflexively, without even realising, to Hirako, a hand signal for _cover my right._ They had developed their unique and sophisticated system of hand signals over years of combat together, and it was almost like another language for the two of them. Hirako instantly obeyed, before Arima even realised what he’d signaled.

As soon as he came into sight of others under the harsh lights he knew he’d attracted even more stares than usual. A torrent of red blood against the famous white squad 0 coat was enough to turn every head in the vicinity. He was thankful that he couldn’t hear any speculation from this distance, even with his heightened senses. Hirako remained absolutely rigid in his defensive position, closer than usual, and though Arima stared dead ahead, he could feel Hirako’s gaze from behind. Quiet concern radiated from the man, although he wouldn’t say a word. Ahead, Marude’s comms trailer was slightly blurry in Arima’s half-vision. His sight darkened for a half-second and he quickened his pace. Surely it was a race against time now to unconsciousness.

He managed to see Akira reach her checkpoint in the distance and relaxed into the pain as he reached the medical van behind Marude’s trailer. For a moment his vision danced again, and it must have shown, for the watchful Hirako did something rarely even discussed; held his good shoulder and kept holding it until Arima reached a chair.

He put the case containing IXA to his side and immediately heard a gasp. Hairu.

“Oh god, oh god, Arima, Arima...”

Hirako’s voice. “Just get to work, Hairu.”

He realised he’d been slipping out of consciousness as she raised his chin with a pointed finger, and he sighed at her face.

“It’s bad, Hairu, my apologies...”

“Stop talking!” She almost shrieked. “I can’t believe this has happened! You! You of all people!”

He didn’t have time to formulate a response before she was tugging carefully at his coat.

“Have to get you out of these clothes, Kishou-san. Tell me exactly what happened and how much it hurts.” Hairu’s voice cut through the haze in his head, and it was uncharacteristically deadly serious.

He grimaced, and helped her ease his coat off his shoulders, after which she flung it immediately into a corner.

“SS Rank at least, bikaku. Aerial attack. Shallow on the neck, deep on the shoulder. I know I’ve lost too much blood already.”

She spread untold amounts of medical paraphernalia around, small hands moving deftly and at lightning speed. There was someone else helping her, not Hirako, but it was on his right side and he couldn’t tell who. He no longer cared much.

“And the pain, Arima-san? Hey, _hey_ -“ she slapped him into focus once more. “Don’t space out on me. I have to know. This will probably need stitches _now_.”

He stilled her hand and looked her dead in the eyes. “ _Not the worst. Not the worst I’ve ever felt._ ” And hoped that, as a Garden child, she would understood what he meant. They had both been through worse.

He had deliberately been avoiding looking at Hirako up to this point, but couldn’t help noticing that at these words, Hirako frowned. He was sat watching them from the end of the trailer, watching his partner, obviously feeling helpless to do anything. Arima looked back at Hairu, with his one good eye.

The coat was off. All he was wearing beneath was a black Kevlar-woven turtleneck. It allowed for more movement and less bulk underground, but in the end had offered little protection against a well placed kagune. And unlike everyone else on his team, despite him constantly reminding the rest of them, he wore no armour except the thinnest plates around his ribs, in an attempt to stop the bruising he got there nowadays. Both he, Hairu and Hirako knew that he should have been wearing it. But these days, with the half-blindness, he’d taken to wearing armour less and less on operations like this, feeling as though he needed the movement. There was also a slight recklessness to this decision, a slight hopelessness that he _didn’t really care any more._ But he’d ignored that. And this was the result.

Hairu cursed him a thousand times as she removed the thin rib-plates.

“Why? Why wouldn’t you wear armour, Arima-san? Do you think you’re immortal?”

That made him smile. And Hairu’s eyes widened as she realised what she’d said. In the corner, Hirako’s frown deepened. He was folding up Arima’s coat into a perfect neat square, obviously feeling a little useless as he watched Hairu and the other person lifting Arima’s black turtleneck carefully over his head.

He grimaced again, and fully blacked out for a few seconds from the pain of moving his shoulder, knowing his glasses were askew and his white hair streaked with blood. The right hand side of his torso was a bloody, ugly mess and his hand felt limp. And he winced as he heard Hairu curse loudly this time, when she saw the bruises littering his ribs. To Hirako or anyone else, this looked like just another injury he’d been hiding, but to Hairu, it meant something worse.

It meant Arima’s half-ghoul healing abilities were slowing down. Time was almost up.

She began to sponge his shoulder with the greatest delicacy, saying nothing. The blood flow had slowed, but the sting of the antiseptic curled his hands into slim fists every time she went over the gash that stretched from one collarbone to his bicep. He fought for consciousness, and knew his face was set that famous blank mask. Hairu saw this, and asked no more questions.

“I’m going to begin stitching now.” 

He gave the faintest ghost of a nod. When she put the first one in, his vision went completely black again, and when he regained it, he realised the other person with Hairu was one of V’s nurses, tight-lipped and narrow-eyed. He might have seen her in a meeting once, his hazy brain told him.

She was halfway along the wound when his mask slipped and his breathing got shallower.

“You’ve lost a lot of blood, Arima-san. I know it’s hard, but it’s a miracle you haven’t passed out yet, so please try and stay with me.”

He caught sight of his face in a mirrored surface of a surgical instrument. He looked nearly grey. She put another stitch in. He closed his eyes.

“You don’t have to be here, Hirako.”

He heard the other man shift on the metal bench.

“I will be here anyway, Arima.”

She put another stitch in, cursing under her breath. Time seemed to slow down. He felt consciousness slipping.

When he woke again, it appeared to be 30 seconds later, and Hairu was slapping his face, hard.

“Arima, you have to stay with me. Please. Arima.” _Slap._ “Arima!”

Every stitch felt like it was seared onto his skin. His entire shoulder felt like daggers were being plunged into it, over and over. He tried to curl up, barely conscious, and felt hands from all directions restraining him - even, his senses registered, Hirako’s. But now he felt weakness clinging to him. A softness. This was a lot worse than he thought. He would not be able to heal himself from it. This meant hospital. Panic rose through the haze, as Hairu pressed something cold to his forehead.

“Hairu...”

“Arima! Please! Stay awake! I need you awake.”

“ _Hairu_.” he said again, this time with as much force as he could muster. He opened his eyes to slits, not registering that they were all leaning over the bench, trying to hold him on his back.

No longer caring if anyone else heard, not knowing if she even could, he said “Promise. Promise me, Hairu. No blood tests. No examinations. Don’t let them... V won’t... Please... Please...”

She said something that sounded like ‘hold on’ and he felt frustration surge.

“Hairu... _no blood tests..._ ”

He heard voices distort as if through deep water, and suddenly felt blissful.

_Let me sink. Please._

And down Arima did sink, down into pleasant blackness.

He didn’t hear Hairu’s cry of anguish, or Hirako’s exclamation. For a short while, he was at complete peace.


	2. don't you understand?

All in all, it had been a Very Very Bad Day by Take’s account.

First off, he was not at all fond of the 24th Ward, and on this occasion he thought that their operation brief was particularly unsatisfactory and pointless. But then again, he had no say. The tunnel they’d been sent down was narrow, which he strongly disliked, there had been a high frequency of especially nasty ghouls, and something he had done must have pissed off Akira, because she kept leaving the worst ones for him to deal with in their 2-man formation. In addition to this, Arima wouldn’t let him join him up ahead of the group, instead leaving Take with orders to command and instruct the rest of Squad 0. It wasn’t that Take was opposed to this per se, but Arima did this more and more nowadays, focusing on training the kids constantly instead of focusing on the task at hand.

It was the one of the most exasperating behaviours in a pattern of behaviours Take had recently begun to notice in his mentor. Arima was performing as exceptionally as ever in the field, with several high-profile operations of late, but in the last few months he had seemed even more checked-out than he normally was. Take wasn’t sure when it had started but he couldn’t help but notice it constantly now. He often caught Arima spacing out, which was not unusual in itself, but these days it was sometimes during operations, in the heat of battle. He could be facing a ghoul head-on and still be staring right through it as though it were a ghost or a computer screen. Take had been meaning to say something.

And now he wished he had. Seeing Arima emerging into the torchlight with his right side covered in blood, an enormous ghoul dead at his feet, Take was shocked, not just by the graphic scene but also by his own internal reaction. He’d thought that maybe Arima had made a mistake in killing it, got the strike angle wrong and been covered in its blood, which ‘the Reaper’ had almost never done before in all the years Take had known him. But no, he’d realised, it was something far worse. 

In the horrid darkness of the tunnel, as Arima’s pale hands shook very faintly, Take felt revulsion at the truth - it was all Arima’s blood. He had not been able to fully defend himself. And again, as Akira rushed forward, Take found himself rooted to the spot and desperate to say something to Arima, but again was suddenly willed into a disgusted silence. In his near-decade of collaboration with Arima Kishou, never before had he seen him hurt beyond a few bouts of exhaustion in the early days. What injuries Arima might have hidden from him, he realised later in the medical trailer, told a different story.

Take had felt nothing, was absolutely numb as he followed his mentor up to the trailer, watching his steps falter from behind. It was an alien feeling, Arima’s weakness. So too were the waves of utter helplessness that washed through him as he watched Hairu and the nurse get to work, and he watched Arima’s tired banter back and forth with the younger woman. But then he’d had to clench his fists because a tremor came to them when Arima’s coat was gone, and he saw that he had been wearing no armour at all. And when Hairu had lifted his shirt and Take glimpsed, beneath the blood, a pale torso littered with gruesome bruises old and new, and an emotion came to him that had not reared its head since the early days of their partnership. 

It was a surge of primal anger, frustration, and a deep rage at the older man, at the secrets he kept and never told Hirako. The years upon years of trust and affirmation Hirako worked himself to the bone for, but never quite received. The merest hint of acknowledgement that everyone around Arima danced like circus monkeys for, but never even got a glimpse of. He felt like a haze of simmering fury, turning Arima’s coat over and over in his hands, until something cut through to him. Hairu to Arima:

“Do you think you’re immortal?”

Arima’s tired smile, and the effect it had on her. The gasp of instant regret, the step back as though she’d said something awful. It made Hirako frown. People called Arima immortal all the time. He’d always been the ‘barely mortal Kishou Arima’.

And then, later:

“You don’t have to be here, Hirako.” Quiet. Sorrowful?

It felt like he dredged up the answer from the depths of his soul.

“I will be here anyway, Arima.”

Because of course he would be here. Where else could he possibly ever be? Hirako could not and slowly had come to the realisation that he would not leave Arima. He watched Hairu’s desperation from across the trailer, and knew she would not either. Neither would Ui, nor Squad 0, nor anyone else who got involved with this blank fucking slate of a man Take could rage bitterly within himself at this fact forever; he could drive himself crazy with asking, he could question God or the ghouls, but the savage truth was that he and everyone else in his God-damned life were never going to be anywhere but with Arima. They couldn’t even try to pretend otherwise. They were irreversibly bound, somehow. Even if Arima left them. Which he did, five minutes later on the floor of the trailer, covered in blood and bruises.

Yes, it had been a Very Very Bad Day for Take. Perhaps even The Worst Day.

And now here he was, in the back of a medical trailer as it sped along the highway to a hospital, casting dubious glances at Arima hooked up to various things on a bed, and doing the best with his limited abilities to comfort a distraught Hairu. As far as he could tell, interpreting through her wails, Arima would live, with no permanent injuries. He did not understand therefore the severity of her reaction, her violent sobbing. He also did not understand Arima’s last words before passing out. The desperation he had detected in Arima’s voice then stayed with him as they sped through Tokyo, Hairu clasped awkwardly in his arms, pink hair sticky with tears.

“Y-you don’t... you c-can’t... _understand_ , Hirako...” Her eyes were red-rimmed as she clasped him like a drawing man. She was certainly right. He didn’t.

“T-the bruises...” Fresh sobbing. “Oh... and he d-didn’t... w-wasn’t wearing _armour_...”

In fairness, these were worrying questions Hirako had too. Arima had always, without fail, worn armour, for as long as he could remember. He was a model investigator, never settling for less than perfection, even though he was arguably the only man who could have got by without it. Take didn’t know how he could have missed Arima’s coat fitting him differently, especially when he had spent countless months, years, following it. There was no plausible reason Hirako could come up with for him not to be wearing it, especially when he never failed to remind the Squad 0 kids to put all of it on, down to the last buckle and pad. Thin body armour covering just the ribs? Even for Arima, that was playing dangerously. The only time Arima had ever made changes to the standard set of armour was when he began to dual wield his quinque nearly a decade ago. It was the type of uncharacteristic behaviour that made Take’s hair stand on end. The bruises, too, were deeply unsettling. There were so many, and they were vicious. Arima had obviously suffered in silence, saying nothing to anyone.

Hirako knew he was possibly the closest to Arima that anyone could have gotten in the CCG. Apart from the almost familial bond he seemed to share with the children and Hairu, Hirako knew in his heart that Arima did not prefer to spend his time with anyone else. And in a decade of such close proximity, when Take could almost count the number of strands on Arima’s head that had turned white by the day, when he could read the other man’s hand signals better than he could a book, Hirako had never known him to get injured. Sure, there was the rare instance of tiredness or sometimes even exhaustion, but never injury, ever. 

Take had even with his powers of quiet observation detected fluctuations in the way Arima acted towards others in the CCG, especially Yoshitoki, Furuta and the higher-up executives over the past two years, but never given it much thought. It was only in the past half year or so he had begun to notice a distinct change in Arima. He could no longer read him as easily, no longer fully understand his attack patterns, like the several times more recently when he had attacked to the left for no apparent reason or advantage. It now seemed that the near misses Take had observed of late had not in fact been near misses, tactics, or feints but actual hits, the source of the awful bruising he had seen on his superior’s ribs.

_And all he wore was that thin armour to cover them._

_Kishou, you are an_ idiot.

His eyes drifted to his partner, laid on the floor with an IV line and bandages crisscrossing his torso as the medical van made several sharp turns. It felt like looking at a stranger’s face. He appeared much, much younger with his hair fallen back across his forehead, without his glasses on, which for some reason was an uncomfortable thought. Hirako squinted. _Almost attractive, if I pretend it’s anyone but Arima_. But it was Arima, and he was unavoidably broken. Dark red blood was smeared across his face and hair, turning the shocking paleness of his skin even paler under the harsh lighting of the trailer. Blood seemed to be everywhere; the medical table, the walls, the coat in Hirako’s hands. And it was on his own coat now, as Hairu clung to him in now-silenced misery. They stayed like that for the rest of the breakneck journey; Take’s muscles ached as he focused on steadying her, staring dead-eyed at the prone body of his mentor.

They reached the hospital in the next 10 minutes, during which by some miracle Hairu fell asleep and Hirako could lay her out on the opposite bed. He thought about the hospital dully. The childhood trauma associated with the echoing sounds of them, the too-bright lights and the lingering odour of not-quite-life, was something he’d always managed to detach himself from. But then that was what he was best at, being detached. 

As the paramedics took over the situation, unloading Arima in a great rush and clatter, Take decided to stay with Hairu. There was no point in following the hospital bed. He couldn’t help. But as Arima was wheeled away, he grabbed one of them aside and repeated Arima’s strange final instruction, which he’d obviously felt was important enough to gasp out with his last breath: _no blood tests._ Take again was given no time to dwell on that request before Hairu woke up, and they had to go through the laborious process of requesting a private room as part of CCG protocol at the reception desk, fill in mindless forms and pick up flimsy bottles of water that seemed unfit for human consumption, and _then_ book a hotel room next to the hospital. Hairu, to her credit, dealt with most of it.

It was around 8:00pm and they sat in the private waiting room when a short white-coated doctor, who to Hirako did not look so different from a dove, came out to update them. Hairu clutched at him like a worried mother.

Take’s brain drifted over sentences such as _severe abdominal abrasion_ and _unprecedented blood loss_ before the doctor’s voice came back into focus. They’d been on the operation in the 24th ward for about 16 hours, and he was fighting his eyelids to stay fully conscious.

“...will be in surgery for about another hour. Intensive care for tonight, and you’ll be able to visit tomorrow. I have also… received a request from your organisation for an early discharge.”

Hairu sat up straighter. “What?”

“CCG protocol,” Hirako reminded her gently, “early as possible discharge for Assistant Special Investigators or above.”

“But doesn’t that mean- oh, yes, nevermind!” She turned back to the doctor to sign some forms. After the doctor had left, Hirako shrugged off his bloodied coat, wincing at the smell of sweat and dirt that clung to him. Hairu did the same, muttering something about how the CCG protocol wouldn't even permit them to leave and get a change of clothes.

He didn’t find out what had occurred to her until later that night, as they got into their single beds in the hotel room in the clipped, rigorously formal way that colleagues do. He detached himself from the awkwardness; he knew Hairu had always respected him as a Squad 0 member and for his close relationship with Arima, which he knew she coveted from afar, but he couldn’t recall a conversation he’d ever had with her that hadn’t been strictly around work. She'd tried, of course, when they first met, but everyone eventually stopped trying that type of friendship with Take. He was just too calm. Casual male camaraderie with Ui was as close as he got. Being clung to as she grieved today seemed like it had happened in another dimension. It was after he courteously switched the light off that she spoke.

“Do you live in a large house, Hirako?”

He thought for a second. Some years ago he’d specifically chosen a traditional style house with few Western fittings, close to his grandparents’ house, with enough space for his dog Aki to run around in. While he didn’t have a particular passion for the way it looked, Take had always appreciated a simple life, and he considered it pretty well furnished and decorated. His house was exactly as he liked it to be - precisely unremarkable. It was in an unremarkable, quiet suburb, and he supposed he couldn’t have asked for better, although with his CCG salary he could have certainly afforded it - he'd actually managed to buy it with the bonus he'd received from partnering with Arima all those years ago. He could not imagine why she would ask.

“I...It’s perhaps a little bit big for me, I suppose. I wouldn’t say it’s large.”

She was silent for an almost uncomfortable amount of time, leaving Hirako to furrow his brow at the ceiling, before continuing.

“Is there room in your house for another person?”

His eyes widened in the darkness. _What… does she want_?

After about 5 seconds, Hairu chuckled wickedly. “Oh… Hirako Take, you’re so funny. Your silence says more than you ever do.”

He waited for her to elaborate.

“You know the CCG protocol means that investigators above ASI rank can’t stay in hospital for their own safety? It was after those Shibuya retribution attacks that they made that a rule... I live in a small flat now, and Arima can’t go back to his house on his own in his condition. He can’t be seen injured at the CCG, so he’s just going to have to stay at your place for a while. That’s what I’ve figured out, anyway. I bet we’ll get a debrief phone call tomorrow telling us exactly the same thing.”

“I see. He’ll be moved to my house tomorrow?”

Hairu sighed dreamily. In their uncomfortably close, dark quarters it seemed almost erotic. “Yes, Hirako… we’ll both get to see him tomorrow, then you’ll go and get your house ready and they’ll probably transfer him in the evening. That OK?”

He mumbled an affirmative. This was… an odd thing to process.

The next question came snaking through the darkness and humidity of the hotel room. “And do you live alone?”

Hirako tried to read her intentions. The question seemed loaded with ambiguity, and for a moment he was genuinely unsure if Hairu was making a pass at him. In Take’s brain it made no sense considering their absolute lack of relationship. He knew a lot of people at the CCG considered Hairu extremely attractive; he’d heard the men go over it many many times in the breakroom at the 1st ward headquarters, daring each other to ask her out. She was in general a very sensual and flirtatious person, and conducted herself as such at the Commission. But it had never been directed at him - all she’d ever been to him was another of those younger investigators who were all brilliant, all put in Squad 0, and all had that same strange demeanour, as if they were some kind of fae subspecies. Like cult followers, faint echoes of Arima Kishou. A little club he’d never quite been able to understand or break into; he knew Ui and Mado were in the same position. It got overwhelming sometimes when they were out on missions and it was as though the children, Hairu and in some ways Arima were all on a slightly higher wavelength, beyond the understanding of mere mortals like Hirako.

She chuckled at his silence, as though the question had answered itself. Then it was quiet for a very long time. Take listened to the soft rustle of her sheets as she moved, still struggling to figure out her intentions. Just as he thought she had gone to sleep, Hairu spoke.

“I’m in love with him, you know.”

More long silence. She didn’t have to elaborate. The words had been ever so slightly high pitched, like her throat was strangling against sudden tears. Take allowed the sentence to wash over him, marinating in it. He wondered how it was possible that he had not previously come to this conclusion by himself. But as he recalled the way in which Hairu had followed Arima around like a lost puppy dog, the way she cluung onto his every word, worked herself to the bone for each meeting and beyond in the field, killed every ghoul for no other reason than to get the chance to please him, the images began to pull through his head like beads on a rosary. They gathered painfully on top of each other in his chest until he could bear them no more, and they escaped him in a cloud of deep pity spread out into the humidity of the room and settled over her. Hairu’s brilliance and drive, he suddenly realised, came from being crushed by a stone every day of her life. The more it ground her into the dirt the more she rejoiced in pushing helplessly back against it. Hirako did not often feel strongly for other people, but all at once he could feel the infinite burden of being in love with Arima Kishou. He chose his words carefully.

“That’s... very unfortunate.”

Hairu shifted, and even in darkness he could feel that she had sat up and was staring at him. He could feel her eyes on him. Her voice had a barely-concealed craziness running beneath it, like an electrical current, which suddenly he realised had always been there. (He reflected for a small moment on how unobservant he had been not to ever notice it before.) Arima had not taught him to be so complacent.

“Take, you fool. It’s not unfortunate. How can it be? Don’t you understand? I thought you would. There’s nothing I can do about it. There’s not a _God damned thing_ I can do about it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> once again, thanks for reading <3 feedback would be much loved


	3. falling slowly and quickly all at once

__

_Since my house burned down,_

_I now own a better view,_

_Of the rising moon._

_\- Mizuta Masahide_

He woke up early, too early, but when he did Hairu was already clattering around in the bathroom, busying herself in front of the mirror. Take got out of bed very slowly, the events of the previous day playing blurrily in his head like an old VHS tape. Every muscle ached; he had not been able to take care of himself and stretch out and unwind as he usually did after every mission. He was wondering vaguely if Arima had any similar form of self-care routine - coming to the unpleasant conclusion that the bruises he’d seen yesterday on his mentor indicated no such thing - when Hairu emerged from the bathroom, perfectly made-up. He knew that visually, she should have been very attractive, but the events of last night made his inner self recoil at the sight of her; just from the awkwardness and pity. There was no trace of yesterday’s tears. She stared as he stretched without meaning to, cocking her head to the side as though she was watching a beetle flailing upside down on a microscope slide.

“Be quick and make yourself presentable,” she told him, “Someone will probably be calling us in about 10 minutes.”

He obeyed wordlessly, not even bothering to question her sharp demeanour despite the fact that he technically outranked her. Hiding himself in the bathroom, in the cold sheets of water in the shower, felt like a welcome escape. Yesterday’s combat outfit was an ordeal to put on - he spent an uncomfortable amount of time shedding all the armour from around the black undershirt, which stank of nervous sweat and the 24th ward, each buckle and clip again drawing his mind back to the fact that Arima had chosen not to wear any of it. In truth, he’d never really thought about it too hard before, but he suddenly found himself loathing the combat outfit of Squad 0 and what it represented. Take did not loathe often, but everything just seemed ridiculous and detestable all of a sudden. He buckled his coat and lashed his boots far too tightly without even realising he was at the door, before remembering they weren’t leaving to see Arima yet. He removed his shoes, Hairu side-eyeing him.Then the blood smeared on his coat collar caught his eye, and he wrestled it off as she set up the comms laptop.

They sat in front of it, awaiting the call. 8:00am, the standard debrief time, came and went, and Hairu turned to him.

“You were out there, not me… Is there any chance that something went wrong - well, obviously _some_ thing went wrong - but that they extended the operation?’

He considered for a moment. “No. The last time we were on the comms Marude said everything was fine.”

She cursed. “ _Damn_ the 24th ward! Never anything good. Always giving us some damn problems…” Hirako raised his eyebrows. She’d always leapt at the opportunity when Arima brought it u- oh.

It got to half past 8 and they made small talk and fidgeted in silence when suddenly the notification sounded, and Kiyoko Aura’s pale face flashed up on the screen.

 _“Hello Hirako, Hairu.”_ They responded in kind. She was direct. _“What’s his condition?”_

“Stable.” Hairu replied. “He’ll make a full and quick recovery.”

Onscreen, Kiyoko frowned. She looked uncharacteristically stressed. Hirako couldn’t quite pinpoint where she was from the background. It wasn’t the 1st ward.

_“That’s- that’s good. Well, listen up you two, I’m only here to tell you what’s going on after you left. We were expecting to complete the operation at 1800 hours yesterday. Special Investigator Arima became incapacitated at 1720 hours. The 40 minutes between those two points… well.’_

_‘There was sudden movement in Area C. High frequency of ghouls that we thought were unaffiliated, all banding together. They came through the tunnel that Squad 0 had cleared.”_

Hirako started, and he heard Hairu breathe in next to him. _What?_

 _“Our second backup team had relocated to document the location in which Investigator Arima became incapacitated, after Marude raised it to a possible significant threat. Squad Naoko were there when this unidentified group of ghouls… counterattacked. I’m afraid there were heavy fatalities. We returned attacks until about 1930 hours, when they too sustained some losses and retreated. I was at headquarters in the 23rd ward, and was summoned there.”_ Kiyoko brushed her dark hair back from her face. Through the pixelation on the screen, he could sense her anguish.

 _“As such, the operation overshot massively. We only finished cleanup and debrief at about 0600 hours this morning. So consider this your debrief. Morgan was supposed to do it, but -”_ She glanced to the side. _“He’s not available right now.”_

Kiyok paused, as if waiting for them to respond. Hirako and Hairu glanced at each other. There was nothing to say, except to wonder how it had all gone so wrong. Everything had been under control and was winding down when they’d left. Squad 0 was supposed to have had the most high-risk task in the operation - one tunnel.

Kiyoko sighed deeply from the screen in a crackle of static. _“For what it’s worth, if you want my thoughts… those unaffiliated ghouls’ only reason for attacking was that they saw Arima leave. It’s well known that the 24th ward fears him in particular. It wasn’t a coordinated attack - they just saw an opportunity. And the rest of the squads saw him leave covered in blood - what were they supposed to think? It demotivated them for sure.” She sighed deeply again. “Just make sure he’s back quickly, OK? We’d all love to know how it’s possible he was hurt.”_

They nodded dumbly, too disheartened by Kiyoko’s briefing to respond. She shifted on screen, and was replaced by a very obviously agitated Itsuki Marude, who ran a hand over his face.

 _“Hello. I think Aura pretty much covered everything there. It’s a nightmare, it really is. Never, in all my time in the 24th… anyway. We’re actually still not sure what happened to Arima and we’re going to need you, Hairu, to give us all that information, Like Aura said, this is unprecedented.... Uh, yes. Now. Hirako: Investigator Arima will have to stay at your house for the duration of his, um, recovery. We’d offer a private room usually, but given Arima’s… public standing in the Commission, that’s not possible. If anyone asks you at all, it was ghoul blood he was covered in, and he got called away to an emergency incident. Yes, if anyone asks… he’s on a different mission. No colleagues in your home please, not even Zero Squad.”_ He kept glancing behind the screen, obviously distracted. Take wondered what kind of logistical chaos was unfolding beyond him.

_“I don’t have time to say much more. That pretty much covers everything. I’ve freed up Akira Mado to provide you both support - and Hairu, there will be a car later in the day to take you to the 1st ward.”_

Hairu nodded, and opened her mouth to say something. The call abruptly ended. Her voice died in her throat, and the silence was deafening.

“Well then.” she said, shutting the laptop slightly harder than was necessary. “That’s all there is to it.”

\---

They talked a little about what Kiyoko had said on the way to the hospital, but neither could really quite put into words what they wanted to say. It was disturbing to think about the destruction that was caused just by a lack of Arima’s very _presence_ alone. _Aura was right,_ Take thought. _Arima could have just been_ sitting _there and no ghoul would have dared._

Take felt strange and unsettled as they were shown into the room. It was not a situation he had ever imagined himself in. He’d sat bedside for more than a few family members and colleagues over the years, but Arima and being in a hospital were two incongruous things. It somehow wasn’t macabre though, in any sense. The private room was well lit with large windows and pot plants that dared to thrive on hospital air, and Arima was sat up reading a book like he sometimes did before meetings. He was always reading, and Take always noticed. He recognised the book; _The Diving Bell And The Butterfly_ \- Arima had been reading it before their briefing on last night’s operation. Take had gone and looked it up like he always did. Written in a hospital bed over 10 months by a paralysed Frenchman who could communicate with the outside only by blinking his left eye; _a morbid choice as ever Arima, as all your choices seem to be nowadays._

. If it weren’t for the tubes going in and out of him, and the fact that beneath the hospital gown there were heavy bandages that wound all the way up to his neck… he looked normal. His face was the sea of calm that it usually was. A small smile rippled across it as he caught sight of them.

“Ah! Kishou! Oh, Kishou…” Hairu couldn’t help herself and sped over to him, almost vibrating in her hidden desperation to touch his hand on the sheet. She talked in a rush that Take couldn’t quite hear. He recalled last night’s conversation. There it was again, that strange, supersubtle kinship he’d never understood. The amount of times Take had ever called the other man ‘Kishou’ could be counted on one hand.

He greeted her accordingly, and then called out “Hirako.” Take saw a small smile reserved just for him. He took a breath, walked over and decided to get to the bottom of it.

“What happened, Arima?”

Arima closed his book with one arm, and fixed Take with a serene look. “There’s nothing to say, I’m afraid - I was just complacent, Hirako. I am very sorry you had to see that.”

Hirako struggled with himself again, feeling that anger. _Stop it. Just fucking stop it. You’re Arima Kishou. You’re not complacent, nor have you ever been. I deserve an explanation. Me, who’s been by your side for a decade, do you still not expect me to stay? Do you still think so little of me? Why can’t you love!?_ Arima kept staring at him, and Take knew that no one else would ever be able to see the emotion in his face. If he was a little more self-aware in that moment, Take would have understood that he was experiencing idol-death.

“I- how do you feel?” It was weak; it was all he could manage. Hairu was looking at Arima like he was the cure to cancer.

Arima looked down at himself. “I’ll confess, it’s not something I’m used to. I don’t think I’ve ever taken a painkiller before in my life. But I’ll live.” Hairu’s knuckles went white on the bar of the bed.

Take knew that was probably the best he was going to get. They made small talk about the operation for a while, talked about Squad 0. Hairu kept attempting to press Arima for information about the ghoul who’d wounded him, but received very little satisfactory response. Take sighed, and told her that it really had just been a particularly strong bikaku. Arima made a noise of amusement and pushed up his glasses.

“For what it’s worth - if I was going to pick an operation to be injured on - this wasn’t a worthy candidate. I’d appreciate it if neither of you passed this on to Marude, but it wasn’t particularly well-planned. I’ve been meaning to talk to him. They rely on me too much nowadays-”

Take frowned. _Nowadays?_ Did Arima’s recent behaviour actually indicate something…? 

“-and it’s only hurting them. Itsuki asks my advice on things that really aren’t my business, then keeps planning his operations around Squad 0. It’s bad practice…”

He lapsed into a conversation with Hairu and Take was again shut out. He let his mind drift. Take himself was meant to be taking Yusa down to the quinque lab today. Akira would have to do it. And then he was supposed to have been going over formation plans with Ui, investigating that one ukaku...He remembered vaguely that Arima was supposed to have had some sort of off-schedule assignment today - but then again, half of Arima’s assignments were ‘off-schedule’. He brought it up.

“You’re right. I was supposed to be meeting with Yoshitoki, and Furuta.” His informal reference to the Washuus would never cease to amaze Take. “A great loss.” Arima’s sarcasm was so subtle at times that most people never even picked up on it, but it never failed to make Take internally amused.

Before long, after they had run through all possible avenues of conversation surrounding the operation, Take sensed it was time to leave, get back into the rush of things. It reminded him of the many times the roles had been reversed when he was younger, before the Arima squad came about; when he’d been in a hospital bed surrounded by other CCG operatives who’d been heavily injured in the same operation, and their friends and family hovered around them. He had no one, he didn’t tell his grandparents about anything to do with the Commission, so his only bedside visitor in those days was Arima. He’d never stay for long, but he’d bring books, give him news and amuse Take for a little while with dry humor and observations. As Arima got older and the demands on him grew greater, he came less and less, but by that point Take was no longer getting injured as much. He did recall with fondness their adorably awkward and sweet relationship, though. Before Arima had grown up, and his hair had started to change. The respect was still there, as was the authority and urge to protect, but Arima was… tired. Of it. Somehow.

He stood up briskly, and their eyes followed him.

“I need to go and prepare my house. Hairu, you’re staying?” She nodded. “‘Til 1.”

“Alright. I will see you later then, Arima-san.” He didn’t know why, after an hour of relaxed conversation with them, he’d lapsed back into workplace formalities, but he couldn’t help himself.

As he bowed to leave, Hairu suddenly came and hugged him, away from the bed. He didn’t have time to react with the shock, but it must have been on his face as he saw Arima smile behind them, and turn back to his book. Hairu hugged tighter, and whispered into his ear informally. _”He needs us, you know.”_

Hirako bent to grab his bag. For some reason, the thought depressed him.

\---  
He took the metro back to his suburb, cringing uncomfortably in his combat clothes. The walk from the station to the end of his street felt like it took a decade of his life, and the humidity seemed as though it was sent to punish him specifically. Tiredness hit him as soon as he stepped foot in the door, and the long, cold shower he took was heavenly. He couldn’t do the post-operation stretches and the deep, daytime sleep he usually allowed himself, however. It dawned on him that there was suddenly a lot to be done. 

He put on somewhat baggy black trousers and a loose beige cuban-collar shirt, feeling oddly informal. The trousers were baggy because he’d used to be far more muscular, long before Squad 0, back when he was trying to work his way up the CCG ranks. This ‘casual wear’ section of his closet was minimalist at best; apart from some simple pyjamas and workout clothes, Take almost exclusively wore suits or combat gear. There was something absolutely freeing to him about the monotony of wearing a suit; he could move through Tokyo without receiving so much as a second glance - but as soon as he put on the Squad 0 coat he became a suddenly ‘one of Arima’s’, a figure of importance for whom people parted for in the CCG. Take knew that he himself was completely unremarkable; it was the uniform people respected. Beyond the privilege that gave him, and a suit, what more did he need? He owned, at most, two outfits that weren’t expressly utilitarian. 

Speaking of his coat - he unpacked his bag, wincing at the small, bloody handprint on its back courtesy of Hairu. He threw it gloomily in the washing machine, and then remembered that he also had Arima’s. As he looked at it, the entire shoulder and sleeve in tatters and covered in dried red, the subtle ‘0’ badge, he suddenly felt revulsion and knew he couldn’t keep it in the house. The gaping tear in the neck seemed to grin cruelly at him, mocking. _You thought the man who wore me was invincible, you fool?_ He bundled it up in a plastic bag and put it in the recycling outside. He knew Arima wouldn’t mind. He probably owned like 5 of them. 

He threw his own in the washing machine with a ridiculous amount of powder. It was probably going to turn grey, but he couldn’t get it dry-cleaned with that awful handprint.

Take couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment he’d realised that a significant portion of Squad 0’s role at the CCG was actually to act as propaganda. When the Arima Squad first formed, it was billed to him as an elite taskforce who would be employed on the most difficult tasks in operations, and remain as normal investigators in the downtime. That wasn’t what happened. But then, after a decade as Arima’s partner, he should have known better. Take sometimes forgot due to his proximity that to most members of the CCG, Arima wasn’t a human, but a god. 

Whoever had dreamt up Squad 0 knew exactly what they were doing; choosing not just the Commission’s strongest Special Investigators, but the strange, aloof ones like Hairu, putting them in white coats… They were intended as an unreachable display of elite strength. 

He hadn’t realised it until Koori Ui had once taken him to a bar in the 3rd ward that was favoured by investigators - they’d still been in their 0 coats, and a hush fell over some tables, other investigators scrabbling to make room for them. The fact that they were under Arima only added to the idolatry. And before long, Hirako realised that they hadn’t been assigned anything beneath an SS rank or a high profile operation in two years. The rest of the time was devoted to meetings with the upper echelons of the CCG, planning and training, and whatever it was that Arima did alone. The rest of the time, they were there on show, in their famous Squad 0 coats.

He snapped back to reality and realised he had to prepare for the reality that Arima was going to be living with him for the next week. Take was not a self-conscious man, but this was a pretty brutal shift from work life to private life. He couldn’t recall ever even discussing where he lived with his partner. Although for some reason he knew a lot about where Arima lived, due to Hairu. He recalled discussions of a penthouse apartment with awesome views in a far out suburb, prime real estate, according to Ui, filled to the brim with books. Take just couldn’t imagine Arima _living_ , cooking at home, reading, watching TV… meeting people? But he supposed the same could be said of him - and he did all those things. Take loved to follow recipes, especially complex ones, and made an effort to prepare at least one difficult dish a week. He found himself caring a lot about ingredients, too. Books weren’t really his thing, although he had a small collection of Western philosophy, and some of the classics. He didn’t watch much TV beyond the news or the occasional cooking show, and instead read, walked Aki or listened to the radio. He could spend hours on the couch listening to his Roberts radio, completely checked out of reality. If he’d had to list hobbies they would probably have been Pilates, yoga and martial arts training, to which he devoted most of his time that wasn’t spent on CCG business.

And meeting people? Huh. He went for drinks with some old Academy friends a few times a month, and talked to his grandparents and several of the old retired people who lived on his block occasionally. There was an older woman named Akari, a married lawyer from a big Tokyo firm who he’d meet every couple of months, an arrangement that had been going on for about five years. She was the only sexual partner he’d ever had; the whim to call her, and she him, did not come along very often, but this seemed to work for both of them. Sometimes he thought he more enjoyed the opportunity to take a woman on a date to a nice restaurant and drink good wine, than the sex it lead to. Take was just not a particularly social person. 

And for a long time, he’d thought Arima wasn’t either. But he’d slowly come to realise that Arima just chose to conduct his business very privately. He spent a lot of time with the Washuus that wasn’t explicitly on CCG grounds, it seemed. He went out with Ui and Akira since Squad 0 was formed, and to Sasaki’s various social gatherings. He met with the Quinx and the Squad 0 children frequently at social gatherings. And of course, there were the scores of investigators, some retired, who’d known him since he was 16. 

There were others, too, unknowns. In the past few years, Hirako had often caught him on the phone, talking to someone softly and happily, in a way which he never had before, and something told Hirako that this person was nothing to do with the CCG. The Reaper quickly hung up on every such occasion. Who exactly it was, was a question that occupied his thoughts intensely for days after each call. Ui had once suggested it was a lover, half-joking half-deadly-curious, but the thought made Take feel sick. The mystery that surrounded Arima extended to every possible aspect of his being, it seemed.

Take quickly set about feeding and watering Aki, and playing with him in the garden for a while, too tired to take him for a walk long enough to be fulfilling. He dragged himself to the grocery store two streets away, impossibly self-conscious in the knowledge he was now buying for two people. He hung his coat on the line, made up the second bed and checked his watch. 1pm. Hairu would be leaving. He didn’t allow the trickle of pity to settle in his stomach. Instead, he tried to look around his apartment with new eyes. 

No one except himself and his grandparents had been inside for a very long time. A shocking amount of time, he now reflected.

Take thought that it was his home, and not another human, that he might actually relate to most in the world. It was traditional, and quite old, but he’d had it all refurbished and modernised when he bought it, with the bonus pay from his Assistant Special Investigator promotion. It was sleek, and painfully subtle. While the house itself wasn’t expensive, Take had taken great pains to fill it with top-range artisan things, because he could. Well. ‘Fill’ was an exaggeration. It was pretty Spartan to the average person, probably. The furniture was minimal, as was the decoration -some classic Hokusai prints and a landscape or two hung from the walls, as well as a handful of framed photos. A small handful. An office space with papers and folders which he didn’t use all that much. Tall houseplants he made sure to water once a month. Aki’s bowls, bed, and toybox. A very large expensive vase, which Akira had for some reason given him one Christmas, was perhaps the most opulent thing he owned. 

The rest was bare wood and wall, simply because he liked the minimalism. He'dlong hated the idea of travelling from the brutal corporatism of the CCG offices (which he actually found logically laid out, and somewhat calming) to a house filled with things that he didn’t want or need. And for as long he could remember, he’d been content with that. 

Now all of a sudden he found himself wondering if it looked _cold._ Empty and blank. Like the person who lived here didn’t really _live_ at all.

__

__

Was that what Arima was going to think? Suddenly he wanted very badly to see Arima’s house. To see the way _he_ lived. He’d always assumed they were probably similar, and lived in similar homes (Did Arima not just live in a plain white box, with a basin and a bed? A cell?). But everything he’d just thought of came rushing back in, and standing in his gleaming kitchen Hirako felt a rush of sorrow. He wasn’t too sure what it was directed at. But it slowly materialised, like a flower unfurling, right then and there, that almost every single person on Arima’s team had either been to his apartment, to bars or cafes with him, or had gone to a social function of some form with Arima in the last few years. 

Every one except Take, his oldest, closest colleague. Those things were what he and Arima HAD done, in the early days of the partnership. It hit him that he should have called those early days what they were: a strange, calm friendship, not a formal partnership. He couldn’t even try and pinpoint when the former had fallen away, and only the latter was left. The sorrow bloomed violently, suddenly. Just as a hot pressure begun to build behind his eyes, a sensation he hadn’t felt in as long as he could remember, something interrupted. 

__

__

His phone, vibrating on the kitchen bench with a call from Hairu. He didn't even have to pick up; she would be telling him Arima was on his way to Take's house. To a threshold not crossed in a decade of knowing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hiiiiiii, sorry for the long delay! life happened. I found these chapters very difficult to write - Ishida never gave Take OR Arima much of a chance when it came to private lives, even in the manga. Pencilling them in while also keeping them both in character is pretty hard...
> 
> For what it's worth, I've always envisioned Take as being pretty similar to many of Haruki Murakami's protagonists - you just can't beat that level or restraint! It's very tricky to write inner monologue like that.
> 
> As always, thanks for reading my ramblings and ANY comments are much appreciated!
> 
> (ps - guess who arima was talking to on that phone :P)

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! if you've got this far, thank you so much! The poem is taken from a translation of RE: chapter 85. Comments and kudos are massively appreciated <3


End file.
